I love having a freezer full of beef. My most normal thing to do would be to slice a steak into small pieces and then make a stir fry with it. Frozen beef + frozen green beans + garlic + ginger etc and I have a fantastic balanced meal without having to go to the supermarket.
[QUOTE=wireweiners;7700815]
How old are your cattle and what sex? Grass fed beef is just nasty, tough and flavorless. It has no where near the flavor as beef finished with grain. I suppose if that’s all you’ve eaten in a while, you’d think its ok but if you did a blind taste test between grass fed and grain fed beef, you’d pick the grain fed every time. I would finish them off the next four weeks with a good finishing grain. Check with your feed store, they should be able to recommend a beef finishing ration.
ETA If you think cooking it in the crock pot is going to make it tender and flavorful, think again. My dad bought a grass fed steer about a year before he died. The roasts were darn near inedible, even after cooking in the crockpot with seasonings. The steaks were passable, if you marinated them long enough. The hamburger was ok for tacos and spaghetti but for hamburgers, no flavor. The ribs were just tough and nasty, even if smoked for hours or cooked in the crockpot.[/QUOTE]
THIS explanation nails it!!! We haven’t had a good piece of beef…or pork either since moving to Oklahoma 9.5 years ago. I can’t tell you how many pounds of “prime meat” I’ve cooked up and fed to my DOGS!!! Grass fed beef has NO TASTE!! It won’t even fry in a pan because it has no fat…at all!! I often joked to my husband and asked if “tonight you want to cook the wrapper or try the meat again??” We have filled our freezer several times with assorted “Choice beef” and still ended up giving to the dogs!! Back in NC we raised our own beefers and fed them grain throughout their lives and had the BEST flavored meat you could ever taste!! One processor said he had never seen such nice cuts of meat!! YUCK to grass fed meat!! JMO!!!
[QUOTE=crosscreeksh;7808457]
THIS explanation nails it!!! We haven’t had a good piece of beef…or pork either since moving to Oklahoma 9.5 years ago. I can’t tell you how many pounds of “prime meat” I’ve cooked up and fed to my DOGS!!! Grass fed beef has NO TASTE!! It won’t even fry in a pan because it has no fat…at all!! I often joked to my husband and asked if “tonight you want to cook the wrapper or try the meat again??” We have filled our freezer several times with assorted “Choice beef” and still ended up giving to the dogs!! Back in NC we raised our own beefers and fed them grain throughout their lives and had the BEST flavored meat you could ever taste!! One processor said he had never seen such nice cuts of meat!! YUCK to grass fed meat!! JMO!!![/QUOTE]
Um…no. We finished ours with grain but 99% of it’s life it was on grass and it’s the most delicious, tender, moist, marbled meat I’ve eaten. If you’ll pay shipping I’ll send you some of mine! :winkgrin:
[QUOTE=TBROCKS;7808464]
Um…no. We finished ours with grain but 99% of it’s life it was on grass and it’s the most delicious, tender, moist, marbled meat I’ve eaten. If you’ll pay shipping I’ll send you some of mine! :winkgrin:[/QUOTE]
That’s because if was finished on grain. Most beef cattle do spend 99% of their life on grass and then are finished on grain for about the last 90 days of their life. It’s the 100% grass, no grain at all that’s so nasty. Actually for the home producer, it doesn’t hurt to feed them some grain throughout their lives and gradually increase it a few months before butchering.
Well my apologies crosscreeksh. I assumed all grass fed beef is finished. Our processor said we’d be very disappointed if we didn’t finish them on some grain. They weren’t on it that long but I guess it makes a huge difference.
Glad that it is so very tasty.
You did good and yes, doesn’t matter if you name them, now the steaks have a name also.
The cycle of life never ends, we are all part of it all, sometimes the steer, others the burger, one way or another.
You know, you don’t have to eat the whole thing now.
It keeps fine in the freezer for long time.
[QUOTE=TBROCKS;7808464]
Um…no. We finished ours with grain but 99% of it’s life it was on grass and it’s the most delicious, tender, moist, marbled meat I’ve eaten. If you’ll pay shipping I’ll send you some of mine! :winkgrin:[/QUOTE]
I’ll pay shipping for some beef!!!
[QUOTE=TBROCKS;7808507]
Well my apologies crosscreeksh. I assumed all grass fed beef is finished. Our processor said we’d be very disappointed if we didn’t finish them on some grain. They weren’t on it that long but I guess it makes a huge difference.[/QUOTE]
Don’t sweat the small stuff.
These have been differences for long time now in how people choose to market their cattle and why.
Both sides are somewhat touchy, with reasons on both sides.
This is a very complicated topic, adding that with the drought, the real shortage of cattle makes them seem like gold nuggets right now.
Anyone with any can make a very good, solid profit, the prices are so high, adding that corn is back to half what it was two years ago, for those that choose to finish them on a grain ration.
Here is more in this controversy between slaughtering off grass directly, remembering that all cattle are raised on grass, or finishing for a few more months on a grain ration and some of what the considerations of this are, why the disagreement:
http://beefmagazine.com/blog/whatever-happened-nation-s-support-capitalism
If we ever get back to having more cattle to sell, if they are not quite so scarce, then the situation may change again, remembering that by finishing on grain, we have gained 1/3 more meat from the same number of animals we had before, mostly slaughtering off grass alone.
[QUOTE=TBROCKS;7808507]
Well my apologies crosscreeksh. I assumed all grass fed beef is finished. Our processor said we’d be very disappointed if we didn’t finish them on some grain. They weren’t on it that long but I guess it makes a huge difference.[/QUOTE]
Beef marketed as grass-fed is supposed to be grass-finished without grain. It can be quite excellent. My neighbor is expert at creating really outstanding grass-finished meats. But, it is going to be a more variable result, producer to producer, than grain-finished, because grass is more variable than something you buy in a bag.
It is also, I think, the case that you want a processor that is good with the carcasses you send him. A poor processor can detract from the meat also.
The grass-finished has a different nutritional profile than grain-finished, which is another reason some people prefer it.
Bluey - one of our boarders got a cow also. He paid I think around $400 for it as a calf. He chose not butcher but sold her and got $1900 for her. He was told if she was pregnant he could have gotten closer to $3000. So yes, there’s a good return on it right now!
[QUOTE=TBROCKS;7771285]
Butcher day is scheduled for this week. And yes, our processor does indeed age.[/QUOTE]
Curious, how long did they let it age?
A friend of ours has a meat cutting business, and he butchered a mix-breed beefer earlier this year, and let it hang in his cooler for over a month at least, and that was THE BEST beef we’ve ever had!
[QUOTE=SuckerForHorses;7811372]
Curious, how long did they let it age?
A friend of ours has a meat cutting business, and he butchered a mix-breed beefer earlier this year, and let it hang in his cooler for over a month at least, and that was THE BEST beef we’ve ever had![/QUOTE]
Something like 10 days.
My FIL knew an old guy that would let a deer hang until it had a blue crust on it and swears it was the best stuff ever… but none of us have the courage to let one hang that long!
[QUOTE=TBROCKS;7808507]
Well my apologies crosscreeksh. I assumed all grass fed beef is finished. Our processor said we’d be very disappointed if we didn’t finish them on some grain. They weren’t on it that long but I guess it makes a huge difference.[/QUOTE]
No problem!! Our next door neighbor rancher grains his cattle year round and gets premium $$ for them. Most ranchers in this area who “grass feed” give no grain and it shows when you go to cook/eat it!! When we raised our own we fed grain all the time, but that might not be necessary. Maybe different grass also makes a difference. All I know is that Ok. beef tastes (or not) like plastic wrappers!!
[QUOTE=TBROCKS;7808464]
Um…no. We finished ours with grain but 99% of it’s life it was on grass and it’s the most delicious, tender, moist, marbled meat I’ve eaten. If you’ll pay shipping I’ll send you some of mine! :winkgrin:[/QUOTE]
What did you use to finish??
